Taylor University has been monitoring recent shootings across the country, including the ones that took place at Michigan State University and The Covenant School in Nashville.
According to a CNN chart that displays data from Gun Violence Archive (GVA), a nonprofit dedicated to tracking mass shootings in the United States, there have been more than 160 mass shootings so far in 2023.
GVA defines a mass shooting as a shooting in which four or more individuals are injured or killed, not including the shooter.
Nearly 650 mass shootings took place in America last year. In 2014, less than a decade earlier, that number was 272.
Skip Trudeau, vice president for Student Development, said the senior leadership team recently reviewed the campus procedures for dealing with an active shooter situation.
The university endorses the run, hide, fight response in the event of an active shooter. According to this method, students and faculty should engage with the attacker physically only as a last resort. Running away from the shooter, or, alternatively, hiding, are considered the better options.
As far as campus security, Trudeau said the university has a 24-hour police presence.
“We have an armed, licensed police officer on duty at all times,” he said.
Jeff Wallace, who serves as the chief of police at Taylor, said he and his officers routinely train as a unit should they need to handle a crisis.
He said it is important for him and his officers to train on campus property.
“A lot of our training is on-site for the sole purpose of knowing the best way to handle a situation in our specific buildings,” Wallace said.
In addition to the training, both Trudeau and Wallace said the university possesses a strong relationship with law enforcement in the surrounding area. According to Taylor’s website, campus police maintain two-way radio contact with the Upland Police Department, Gas City Police Department and Grant County Sheriff’s Department.
Wallace said that because Taylor’s police are part of central dispatch, they hear every 911 call made in the tri-county area.
“It makes a smaller department and smaller pockets of departments, the collaboration makes us like one big department, which is really good,” he said.
Even with the strong relationships between local departments, Trudeau said it’s important that students play a role in keeping campus safe.
If somebody sees something, then both Trudeau and Wallace greatly encourage them to say something.
“If students have a concern, no matter how minor it is, we want them to call (and) we want them to say, ‘I observed this,’” Trudeau said.
Wallace said no concern from a student is too small.
“If something doesn’t seem right to you, trust it, call us, let us figure it out,” he said. “Thank the Lord that most of it is nothing, but let us determine that.”
The video featuring Wallace that details what to do in an active shooter situation can be found here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gE8xDLWA5Uc.
Campus police can be reached during business hours at 765-998-5395. To reach campus police after business hours, dial 765-998-5555. For all emergencies, including the unlikely event of an active shooter, dial 911 if it is safe to do so.
